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Saturday, May 19, 2012

The parable of the car seat

Lora and I had our first big conflict, and not surprisingly, it was
about Benjamin. A few weeks ago, Lora was with her Mom and in their
pickup. She mentioned that she was able to strap the car seat in
without the base and that it felt more secure than it did with the car
seat base.

I was wise enough at the time to not make a big deal
about it, but I was thinking that that was a mistake. You shouldn't try
to fit and strap something as important as a car seat in a way that it
wasn't intended. Fast forward to last night. She mentions the plan to
pick up the table she bought at the D.I. by trading our car for the
pickup at the temple where Lora's parents left it.
She said, lets just not try to move over the base and strap it in the
same way as I did last time. I was silent. She got angry because she
felt that I didn't trust her with our son's life. I could understand why she felt that way, but I just couldn't feel comfortable using the
car seat in a way that it wasn't designed for. We kind of let it go and
went to sleep. Today, when we got to the temple parking lot she
asked about it again. I said I wasn't comfortable with it and just moved the base
over to the pickup. It didn't help anything that it was really easy to do. She was
really mad at me because I didn't even ask to see her way. Again about the trust. She let me know how she felt. I let her
know that I felt justified and that I shouldn't have to feel guilty
about not wanting to do it in a way that it wasn't designed for. She
tried to rebut with the fact that car seats didn't always have bases,
but had frequently been strapped in without them. I didn't know how to
say anything that didn't make her sound like she didn't know what she
was talking about. Of course car seats had been strapped in without
bases. My point was that they had been designed for that, but how can
you trust a car seat to keep a baby safe if you don't use it how it was
designed to be used, and furthermore, it might even be a risk of getting
a ticket.

She was giving me the silent treatment, and I was
trying not to be affected by it. We arrived home after picking up the
new table. I could see that it wasn't good to let things lie, so I
asked, "OK, can you show me how you were going to strap it down?" She
didn't want to get into it. It was too late for that because I hadn't
even trusted her enough to even let her show me before. Seeing it now
wouldn't change that. We had some more tentative back and forth with
things that I don't even remember. Lora finally showed me that she used
these notches that looked like they were supposed to be used for that
purpose. I looked at them and was surprised to see them there. I
looked down at the picture of the instructions and saw that, surprise of
surprises, the seat was designed to be strapped down without the base
and she had done it the correct way.

Now I felt the egg all over
may face. I don't know why I had assumed that her way was not how it
was designed to be used. If I would have thought about it in terms of
what was possible and not in terms of whether I was justified, I would
have probably realized that of course a car seat can be strapped down
correctly without the base. Who would want a car seat that didn't? The
way she had described it the first time for some reason sounded like
she had done something not intended and I was stuck on that assumption.
This isn't to say that it was her fault. It was definitely my fault for
making the assumption, and it was definitely my fault for not even
letting her show me her way. I don't know why I wasn't even willing to
look at how she would have done it. If I had even an inkling that her
way was how it was designed to be used, there would have been no problem
whatsoever; and letting her show me her way would have quickly
demonstrated that it was correct. Part of it was, in all of my thinking
and justifying, that either way wouldn't be that much different in how
hard or how much time, and I wanted to show her that, and so I just
said no and switched the base.

Fortunately, when she saw that I
was dead wrong by looking at the instructions and that I was pretty
embarrassed, she wasn't angry anymore. Gloating, yes. Angry, thank
goodness no. I guess she had earned the right to gloat.

This
whole thing reminded me of a religious talk I heard once. I don't
remember who gave it. He talked about how he had learned to trust his
wife, even with things that made no sense. I don't remember the
specifics, but it was in things like using the washer and dryer, you had
to do a certain trick. To him, that trick made no sense. It didn't
seem bound by the any laws of physics, yet his wife insisted, and when
you did the trick, it worked. There was one day the he was in the
garage and needed to clean up something with the vacuum. It wasn't
starting when he turned it on. He called into the house and asked his
wife about it. She called back that you had to step in the bucket.
Again, this made no sense to him whatsoever. How would having a foot in
the bucket make the vacuum start. So he did as she had told him,
having trust, but not understanding. It didn't work. He called into
the house and said as much. She came out, looked at him and asked,
"What in the world are you doing? I told you that you had to flip on
the breaker."

I think that his talk was about following the Lord even when some paths
he leads make no sense to us now. Also on
making sure we come to understand his will clearly. I think about the trust that this man
had for his wife, despite his own experience and knowledge. Today showed that I
didn't have that kind of trust for my wife. I hope I can show her that
trust in the future.

Private Blogs

"The calendar advanced, and there was no baby. The English language lacks the words 'to mourn an absence.' For the loss of a parent, grandparent, spouse, child, or friend we have all manner of words and praises, some helpful, some not. Still, we are conditioned to say something, even if it is only 'I am sorry for your loss.' But for the absence, for someone who was never there at all, we are wordless to capture that particular emptiness. For those who deeply want children and are denied them, those missing babies hover like silent, ephemeral shadows over their lives. Who can describe the feel of a tiny hand that is never held?" - Laura Bush